The fight with Pete Holmes: Mayor McGinn's folly

JOEL CONNELL, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

By JOEL CONNELLY, SEATTLEPI.COM STAFF

Published 8:12 pm, Friday, March 1, 2013

Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes: He was chairman of Seattle Police Department's accountability review board, and insisted on release of police records. He was among the first to call for police reform, and used his position to call for reform of state marijuana laws..

Photo: JOSHUA TRUJILLO

Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes: He was chairman of Seattle...

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn, left, and Seattle Police Chief John Diaz. The mayor's office has accused City Attorney Pete Holmes with undercutting Diaz in negotiations with the Justice Department.

Photo: Casey McNerthney, Seattlepi.com

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn, left, and Seattle Police Chief John...

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announcing members of the Community Police Commission. The mayor showed little interest in police issues when he ran in 2009, He is now assuming the mantle of police reformer. Several McGinn re-election supporters sit on the commission.

Photo: Seattle Channel

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announcing members of the Community...

Mayor Mike McGinn announces for reelection, greeting immigrant and refugee representative Mohammed Sheik Hassan. He is making police reform a centerpiece of his re-election campaign, and trying to push Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes out of the process.

Photo: JOSHUA TRUJILLO

Mayor Mike McGinn announces for reelection, greeting immigrant and...

As chairman of the SPD's Office of Professional Accountability Review Board, Pete Holmes tangled with then-Chief Gil Kerlikowske (now federal drug czar). "To me, this is all about good government. Gil (Kerlikowske) assumes everything we do is politically motivated. ... I wanted it to be about process. Long after Gil's gone, long after Mayor (Greg) Nickels is gone and long after I'm gone, I hope there's a process in place that will help us get some results." The process is now a Justice Department consent decree.

Photo: Karen Ducey, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

As chairman of the SPD's Office of Professional Accountability...

Joel Connelly has been a staff columnist for more than 30 years. He comments regularly on politics and public policy.

City Attorney Pete Holms has forgotten more about the Seattle Police Department than Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn is likely ever to learn.

McGinn should listen to, and lay off, Holmes. Curiously, he won't.

Holmes is learning, if he didn't already know, a lesson about reforming police departments. A bare-knuckles effort will seek to sideline the original advocate(s) of reform: It happened with those who blew the whistle on Seattle's bribe-greased gambling tolerance policy in the early 1970s. McGinn is trying it now.

A bit of background:

Holmes was a bankruptcy lawyer who found himself chairing the Seattle Police Department Office of Professional Accountablility Review Board. He fought doggedly and with skill against the SPD bureaucracy and powerful Police Guild, seeking to have police records and Review Board reports released.

He ran against City Attorney Tom Carr, who had described his role as that of "neutral legal advice," in 2009. Holmes ousted the incumbent with a phenomenal 63 percent of the vote. He started to shake up the city's law department by opening up the hiring process and seeking bids from law firms to defend SPD officers accused of misconduct. The defense was long the sinecure of a single firm.

As a mayoral candidate in 2009, McGinn evinced little interest in law enforcement or SPD-related issues. He was initially unable to answer the simplest questions about police issues. The Sierra Clubber was about opposing the viaduct tunnel, expanding broadband service and injecting the mayor's office into education policy.

Pete Holmes is an elected official with the wisdom to take a proactive approach to the job for which voters hired him.

He could see coming, and privately forecast, the scathing Justice Department report on Seattle police use of force that came out early last year. Later, as McGinn fumbled with his "20/20" initiative, the city attorney was on the receiving end of warning letters from Justice. The feds rightfully questioned the city's good faith after documents on the feds' investigation leaked out.

Strange as it is to say this about a lawyer, but Holmes has been sort of like that guy who follows and cleans up after the elephants in a parade.

He urged McGinn to cooperate with the Justice Department at a time when Hizzoner was dawdling. Holmes sent a letter urging a negotiated consent agreement rather than facing a Justice Department lawsuit. He backed L.A.-based expert Merrick Bob as independent monitor to oversee the accord. McGinn opposed the appointment. It was rammed down his throat by an 8-1 City Council vote.

As city strategist, Holmes has consistently been right: McGinn threatened to take the city into a legal battle with Justice, while tossing around out-of-thin-air estimates on the cost of reform.

Yet . . . yet, McGinn has sucker-punched Holmes. In a letter from Hizzoner's legal adviser, Holmes was accused of violating attorney/client privilege by sharing privileged information with Bobb. The letter was leaked to KIRO radio. It demanded an "ethical screen" be erected between the city attorney and the city's attorneys handling reform of the SPD.

Holmes was also hit with a charge -- totally untrue -- that he approved payment for alcohol charges on invoices submitted by Bobb's team of monitors. In fact, Holmes' office told the monitors that the city does not reinburse expense claims for spirits. The monitors originally submitted -- but later removed -- charges of $22.50 for four drinks and $5.99 for a corkscrew.

It's enough to drive a man to drink. Disturbingly, KIRO seems to have carried water for McGinn. The Stranger, once so sharp in City Hall reporting, has given the dispute superficial, snarky, lazy, this-is-a-cat-fight treatment.

The issue is clear. Holmes is the elected city attorney, picked by voters on his promise not just to advise city departments, but to be a public advocate. He has kept that promise, notably as a spearhead to marijuana policy reform.

On the painful issue of police use of force, Holmes has steered the city to face its responsibilities, avoid a lawsuit with the Justice Department and retool training of Seattle Police officers in use of force. McGinn resisted, then suddenly morphed into a reformer as he seeks re-election.

Holmes has EARNED public trust. He shows no signs of backing off, and will not allow himself to be discredited. The tough guys at the mayor's office have challenged a steely public servant.

McGinn should get some of the same training to be given Seattle officers. Hizzoner's behavior in this matter threatens to become a compelling argument for why voters should not give him a second term.